Inaugural lecture

Lecture, Peace Histories Seminar Series

Our solar system probably evolved in the same way as most of the other planetary systems around us. This has been shown by German-Austrian-Dutch research on more than 870 planet-forming disks in the Orion cloud A. The five researchers, including three from the Leiden Observatory, published their findings…

An international team of researchers led by Alice Booth (Leiden University, the Netherlands) have discovered methanol in the warm part of a planet-forming disk. The methanol cannot have been produced there and must have originated in the cold gas clouds from which the star and the disk formed. Thus,…

Before founding their American colony, the Pilgrim Fathers first lived in Leiden in the early 17th century. This group has no fewer than nine American presidents among its descendants. The University played an important role in the Pilgrims’ life in Leiden.

On Thursday 31 October 2019 several graduation ceremonies for study programmes of the Institute of Public Administration were held. It was the first time these festivities took place at Campus The Hague.

Debate, College Tour de podcast

Debate, College Tour de podcast

Inaugural lecture

PhD defence

Valedictory lecture

Symposium

Lecture and discussion

In November, Leiden organized a book presentation to celebrate the first Dutch translation of the collected works of the twentieth-century poet W.H. Auden. A poetry translation contest added lustre to the occasion. There were no fewer than three winners.

Debate

Alumni event, Lezing

China makes no secret of its ambitions to become the world’s leading nation. What can we expect now that the EU and the rest of the world are in recession? And why did President Donald Trump suspend US funding to the World Health Organization? Rob de Wijk, Professor of International Relations and Security…

In the late colonial Netherlands Indies, starting from 1892, homes were set up for the re-education of children. At first by private individuals, later by the government. Much later still, privately funded institutions existed alongside government-funded ones. Annelieke Dirks’ defence on 23 June 201…

The university is home to many pearls of research institutes that do not make the news every day. The Executive Board visited one such pearl, the Institute of Philosophy, on Tuesday 1 July. It resulted in an inspired conversation.

Dutch mosquitos are more resilient to saltwater than previously thought. Environmental scientist Sam Boerlijst discovered this during his PhD research at the Hortus botanicus. This knowledge is crucial for understanding how mosquito-borne disease transmission might change in the future.

The tenth International Conference on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) and the Pacific will be a special edition with a focus on reconciliation. The fatal shooting in 1722 will be remembered, when the Dutch shot and killed ten Easter Islanders. The conference will be held in Leiden from 19 to 24 June.

A fragment of a human skull from the collection of the Dutch National Museum of Antiquities (RMO) and a decorated bison bone, both from the North Sea bed, are rare finds from the end of the last Ice Age. The finds are 13,000 years old and, as such, form the earliest known modern human from the Netherlands…

A thousand-year-old tooth has provided genetic evidence that the so-called

From the 19th century, Dutch colonisers on Curaçao relied heavily on the Catholic church. Missionaries provided not only teaching and spiritual care for the Catholic Afro-Caribbeans, they also ensured social order and peace. However, these benefits came at a price. The gap to good education and participation…

Professor of Higher Education Estela Mara Bensimon approaches diversity from a specific viewpoint. Examine and reflect on your own motives, is her advice to lecturers. Do you know for sure that you don't treat students from minority groups differently?

During pre-Columbian times, the Central American isthmus was marked by dynamic exchange and human mobility. Despite this, indigenous communities were archaeologically stable between AD 300 and the 16th-century Spanish colonisation, contrasting with the cycles of florescence and decline of neighbouring…

Indigenous philosophies have been ignored for too long. This prompted Osiris González Romero to study the wisdom of the Nahua in Mexico. Their philosophy has an important message for the consumption society: see the earth and nature as living beings and not just as resources. PhD defence 22 June.

A sense of security plays an important role in the decision to contribute to nature conservation. Stacey Mac Donald conducted four years of research on the influence of social and political changes and the (post) colonial context on nature conservation in the Dutch Caribbean. On 17 May she will defend…

Debates about the ‘end’ of the Roman era, how, when, and even if it ended, are still very much alive and raging. However, what happened after the (long) late antique period is a lesser-known and lesser-studied subject. The post-Roman past needs, however, as much energetic investigation and discussion.…

The changes that humans are making to the landscape are beneficial for mosquitoes that spread diseases such as Zika, chikungunya and dengue. This is what biologist Maarten Schrama and his colleagues write in the journal Nature Scientific Reports. ‘If we know in which living environments mosquitoes thrive…

All over Europe you will find ethnographic museums with large collections of indigenous objects from Latin America. These collections shaped the image of native populations in the European mind. An ERC Starting Grant allows Dr Martin Berger to look at the bigger picture, contextualizing individual collections…

The 4th Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) meeting was held at the Faculty of Archaeology on 20 November. Ambassadors and representatives from countries in Latin America and the Caribbean region met with the Leiden LAC region group to strengthen academic cooperation and discuss the internationalisation…

Kitesurfing, colonising the Binnenhof and most important of all - meeting fellow students. More then 700 students of Leiden University in The Hague get to know the city and one another during the HOPweek.

When you think of political philosophy, you think of Immanuel Kant, Georg Hegel and Johann Fichte. Both philosophers are considered great representatives of German idealism. University lecturer in Continental Philosophy Marie Louise Krogh has received a Veni subsidy to delve deeper into the German idealists…

Leiden researcher Ethan Mark has a mission, he explains in the alumni magazine Leidraad. He wants us to take off our Eurocentric glasses when we study the Second World War. We have focused on ourselves for far too long; after 75 years, it’s about time we listened to stories from the rest of the worl…

In the period between the First and the Second World War, many Muslim intellectuals came to Europe. What impact did they have on each other’s, as well as on European thinking, and how were they in turn influenced? Leiden Islam expert Dr Umar Ryad has been awarded an ERC Starting Grant to investigate…

The Persian language and its poetry are intertwined with the history of Central Asia. Although some mediaeval poets were later claimed by an individual state, their influence knew no frontiers. This is what Gabrielle van den Berg, Professor of Cultural History of Iran and Central Asia, argues in her…

An evolutionary 'trap' that has haunted crested and marbled newts for 25 million years: Leiden researchers have uncovered a mysterious DNA error that should not be able to arise – yet persists all the same. How is that possible? PhD candidate James France found new clues.

With a combination of incidental sunshine, torrential rain, and wind chills, weather conditions were not ideal for a hiking excursion. Even so, last Saturday, honours students braved a trek across an estate and a golf club in Wassenaar to learn about the relationship between gardens and nature. From…

Samen met een groep enthousiaste wetenschappers bezocht ik deze maand verschillende universiteiten en andere kennisinstellingen tijdens een kennismissie in Indonesië.

In cities, parks take the blame for mosquito problems. However, the real issue is usually a few streets away. Drains and standing rainwater create ideal breeding grounds for larvae. As a result, controlling adult mosquitoes in parks makes little sense, says environmental scientist Louie Krol in his…

Forty participants celebrated completing the Kingdom Affairs course with their instructors, family and friends on Friday 24 April. What is this new course about, and why should people take it?

PhD defence

Tech giants such as Google, Apple, and Microsoft are increasingly shaping the digital world we live in. Reijer Passchier cautions: 'Urgent measures are needed to curb this influence.'

Democracy is under pressure all over the world. With the #DemocracyinAction project, university lecturers Sara Brandellero and Kamila Krakowska Rodrigues want to investigate how grassroots art projects manage to keep democracy alive.

Where European integration has long been understood as a peace project, Joris Larik argued in his Havel-Cleveringa Lecture that recent developments point to an accelerated shift towards a European Union that places its interests, security and geopolitical position more centrally.

The ISSC's ICT helpdesk receives dozens of questions from staff and students every day. A collaboration between TNO, LUCL and the ISSC aims to determine whether a specially designed chatbot could provide support in this area.

Inaugural lecture

Inaugural lecture

Inaugural lecture